1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a vehicle including a door that is able to be opened/closed.
2. Description of the Related Art
Vehicles suitable for running on uneven terrain, such as ROVs (Recreational Off-highway Vehicles) and side-by-side ATVs (All Terrain Vehicles) are known in the art. Some vehicles of this type include upper frames located over the seats when the vehicle is seen from the side and extending in the vehicle front-rear direction, and doors that are able to be opened/closed under the upper frames beside the seats. With such vehicles, there is no window glass between the upper frames and the doors, and the space therebetween is open all the time. Therefore, a passenger is able to put his/her hand inside the vehicle from outside the door without opening the door. Based on this characteristic, vehicles have been proposed in the art, in which the lever to open/close the door is provided only on the inner side of the door. Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2009-241817 discloses such a vehicle.
The vehicle disclosed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2009-241817 includes a door whose front end portion is supported on a vehicle body frame by a hinge mechanism, and a door lock unit that locks the door in the closed position. The door lock unit includes a rotatable shaft extending in the vehicle front-rear direction, an open/close lever supported on the shaft so that the open/close lever rotates together with the shaft, and a latch mechanism attached to one end of the shaft. The open/close lever is located in an upper portion of an inner wall of the door, and is easily operated from outside the door.
The latch mechanism of the door lock unit locks the door by engaging with a latch striker fixed on the vehicle body frame, or the like. While the latch striker is located to the side of the seat, the latch striker is preferably located rearward of the front end of the seat so that the latch striker will not be in the way of a passenger getting into/out of the seat. In the vehicle disclosed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2009-241817, the vehicle body frame includes a hip guard located on the side of a rear portion of the seat, and the latch striker is fixed to the hip guard.
The latch mechanism engages with the latch striker when the door is closed. Therefore, if the latch striker is located rearward of the front end of the seat, the latch mechanism needs to be located rearward of the front end of the seat when the door is closed. With the door lock unit disclosed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2009-241817, the latch mechanism is attached to one end of the shaft, which rotates together with the open/close lever. If the length of the shaft is increased, the action of the open/close lever and the action of the latch mechanism will likely be out of sync with each other. Therefore, it is difficult to increase the length of the shaft, and the open/close lever needs to be located in the vicinity of the latch mechanism. For the sake of convenience for a passenger getting on/off the vehicle, the latch mechanism is preferably located relatively close to the rear side. Therefore, for a vehicle such as that disclosed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2009-241817, the open/close lever needs to be located relatively close to the rear side.
The position of the open/close lever that is easy for a passenger seated in the seat to operate the open/close lever may vary depending on the specifications of the vehicle. With the vehicle disclosed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2009-241817, however, the open/close lever needs to be located relatively close to the rear side. Thus, it may not be possible to locate the open/close lever at such a position that the open/close lever is operated easily.